Category: commissions

Long Distance Commission, chapter 2

After my conversation with customer Mr. J about all the special things on his former house, I did a new sketch, this time a bit more careful with all the details. Usually a loose sketch works for oil paintings, but this job requires more.

Mr. J requested that I send him the two sketches when the painting is finished. This is something I usually offer to customers, so I said “of course!”. Then I thought he might need to see how they actually look—two 4-1/4 X 5-1/2” sketches on a piece of 8-1/2 X 11” paper from my printer. (We used to call this “typing paper”.)

I worked a bit more on the first one, just so it doesn’t look radically sloppier than the second one.

After that, I took a few photos of it on the table, arranged more neatly than how things actually look while I am working, because although I don’t participate on Facebook or Instagram or any of those things, good effort in photos has always been important to me.

Then, why not just show the long distance Mr. J. a bit more of my studio and view?

Mr. J is very pleasant to work with, and we are enjoying getting to know one another. Fortunately he isn’t in a hurry, because I have the other custom oil painting, a mural to paint, and I had that show last weekend. Plus we had rainy days, which make it a little too dark to see well enough to paint well.

Soon, I will begin the painting. I’m a little nervous, but in a good way, the kind of nervous that makes me ultra careful.

commission oil painting

Long Distance Commission

The wonder of the interwebs has brought me a customer that I most likely will never have the pleasure of meeting in person. Let’s call the customer Mr. J. Mr. J and I have gotten acquainted in the comment section of The Frugal Girl blog, and he asked me to paint the home he used to own. “Used to own” means that getting photos is now a bit tricky. New owners almost always make changes, so I am working from several photos, all taken from different viewpoints and at different times in the home’s existence.

Mr. J is a very precise communicator, responsive, specific, and always willing to email, text or talk on the phone.

The project began with an email almost a year ago. We discussed canvas sizes and prices. Mr. J wanted to wait until spring to get photos with certain plants in bloom. Spring came and went with no photos. I’ve learned through the decades that until money exchanges hands, it is simply conversation. I didn’t bug him, knowing that he is a person who will follow through when he is ready.

This past summer, or perhaps early fall, he sent me photos and a deposit check for half down, so we were in business.

Looking through multiple photos taken from different angles, in different seasons, and at different times in the house’s life, I started with a colored pencil sketch, which I scanned and emailed for feedback.

Mr. J sent it back to me in this form: black and white, covered with notes.

I studied it, and realized we needed to have a conversation. We talked quite awhile, and I made lots of notes. The conversation was very helpful in understanding things that made no sense in the multiple photographs.

When I realized the degree of detail that Mr. J wants, I suggested a pencil drawing. He was unsure, because the finished piece will be displayed with other paintings of other buildings. I sent examples of my detailed architectural drawings, and a week or two later, he replied that oil was his preference.

To be continued. . .

New Oil Commission, Chapter 6

We last saw this oil painting commission looking like this. I actually wrote a long list of parts that need work, but it was really unnecessary because I can see what to do.

We refer to this section of trail as the Green Tunnel in the summer months and the Yellow Tunnel in the fall. Customer Mister asked that I add some yellow leaves; I think he would like the painting to reflect the crossover time between the two seasons. So, I did.

Then I kept tinkering around, adding branches, background, more leaves to the upper right, more bark, more trunks in the distance, on and on and on. Who will tell me if/when I finish this?? Not yet—the humanoid will take hours of tiny brush work.

This needs to dry for a little while before I keep detailing. Tomorrow I will be showing you another oil painting commission.

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New Oil Commission, Chapter 5

Before I finished layering the background things, I blew off any discipline about painting, ignored conventional wisdom about The Way You Are Supposed to Paint, and I launched into detailing.

When I draw, I work from top to bottom, left to right. This way I don’t rest my hand on finished parts, thus not smearing graphite around. So, in spite of generally painting from back to front (the farthest away thing like the sky first, moving forward toward the closest objects), sometimes I resort to drawing with my paintbrush in places where there are enough layers to warrant the detail. This means the left side of the canvas might start looking pretty good while the middle and the right side still resembles a dog’s breakfast.

I couldn’t see very well with the doors open and bright light behind the canvas, so I rotated it. Hence, the colors appear to have changed. (Did anyone notice this?)

Bark on trees, more branches, better grasses, humanoid becoming more human (and now wearing shorts), more leaves, more this, that, and the other thing.

It was a very satisfying afternoon of painting (and only a little mosquito slapping.)

HEY, SEARCH ENGINES, IN CASE YOU ARE LISTENING, THIS IS A PIECE OF CUSTOM ART, AN OIL PAINTING OF A MINERAL KING SCENE. (Just in case there are a handful of folks who wish to join my tens of readers and see how a painting is built by this regional artist, this self-trained, user of a paintbrush like a pencil.)

WHAP, SLAP!! WHY are there mosquitos still plaguing me in November, for Pete’s sake?!

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New Oil Commission, Chapter 4

About the mural

The threat of rain prevented me from beginning on Friday. More relevant:the powers that be did not offer me a key to their building, which means I can only paint on Fridays. This coming Friday I will be setting up for the Holiday Bazaar, and the following Friday is part of Thanksgiving weekend, with no idea if the library will be open. So, why start and then wait 4 weeks before continuing??

Commissioned Mineral King Oil Painting

This custom piece of art, a commissioned oil painting of a Mineral King scene for a customer we will call Mister while not assigning any pronouns in order to protect anonymity, is starting to come together enough that I am no longer questioning the wisdom of accepting the job.

You can see the difference in color below because the sun was behind the hill. The inferior camera phone makes adjustments for low light, while changing the color. I sat down to work on the foreground, to get the darks and lights in the right places, hoping the colors were good (are shadows blue? purple? or just darker dirt and darker grass colors?). Tricky stuff to paint in low light.

I got tired of slapping mosquitos so I stopped after here. (Stopped painting, in hopes that I could stop slapping.)

I am still somewhat apprehensive about my ability to create a humanoid which is not only believable, but recognizable.

But it is too soon to worry about this. Actually, why worry at all? Instead, I’ll continue to paint.

I considered making a list of everything remaining, but it is too soon for that too.

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New Oil Commission, Chapter 3

On Monday, you saw this version of the custom oil painting of a Mineral King scene.

Next, I put more paint on the sky and worked more carefully on West Florence. (The humanoid is still a mess.)

Time to rescue the humanoid from embarrassing me. Wait, time to rescue me from the embarrassment of the humanoid. Something. . .

What’s different here? A little more background spots, using dark green and the grayish blue/bluish gray of West Florence.

Let’s make like a tree and leaf.

More color and texture on the tree trunks.

Something… Oh. I moved the tree on the left closer to the viewer.

In spite of using Trail Guy as a human-size model in the scene, I’ve decided to make the human larger in the painting.

Many more leaves, branches, trunks, grasses, and trail work to go before getting into the nitty-gritty of putting the correct human in the painting. That is going to stretch my skill to the nth degree.

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New Oil Commission, Chapter 2

Here is my usual collection of thoughts about custom art: This is too hard, I’m a washed-up has-been, why does anyone think I am qualified? And: These people are counting on me and I’d better get started because it is going to be hard and take a very long time. Finally: Just paint, you Goober! You know how to do this!

This is what you saw at the end of Monday’s post:

I started with sky because it is the farthest away, then put another layer on West Florence.

Sometimes I turn the canvas sideways because I can better control the brush and see it better for certain areas.

Here I started putting more paint on the trees. I’m also just planting them where they look right to me. The actual tunnel is kind of a mess, hard to find individual trees. If I painted more loosely, I could just slap on spots of various shades of green and then put in hints of blue sky beyond along with hints of tree trunks. But then I wouldn’t have gotten this job, because Mister likes my style of painting, not that loosey-goosey style.

This must have something changed for me to have taken another photo. Oh, I see that I tried to take some of the ridiculousness away from the humanoid-like figure.

More tomorrow. . .

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New Oil Painting Commission

“Commission” means someone is paying me to paint custom art for him. Them. Her. Shhhh, I think it will be a Christmas present.

Let’s call the customer Mister. You can decide if it is a man, a woman, or several humans. Mister decided on 20×20”, a square format. The canvas arrived, and I put a very thin coat of paint on it.

This is the version of the requested scene. Yes, it is Mineral King, and that is Trail Guy for size reference.

No wonder my laptop gets splatters on the screen.

Here is the beginning. The photo says “Yellow Tunnel” but Mister is requesting the tunnel to be green.

That’s as far as I got. When it dries, I’ll put in a better sky and a better West Florence (that’s the peak on the left side of Farewell Gap.)

In case you are curious, I painted the tunnel in the green season several years ago. (If it feels like three years, it was probably six.)

Heh-heh, it was actually just five years ago. I think I paint better now. Sure hope so, otherwise I am One Stuck Central California artist. Gotta keep improving. . . always. And don’t give me this “your own worst critic” stuff either, because if I’m not, how will I get better?

And that’s all I’ve got to say about that. For now.

P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LAURIE!

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Drawing with Pencils

I guess you could draw with chalk or a paintbrush or your finger on a fogged up window, but drawing with pencils is what I do.

Student work

It’s also what I teach. A returning drawing student had one month free for lessons before embarking on a new chapter of life. We dove right in, and she stayed for several hours each time rather than the normal one hour weekly lesson. The final one took place in my studio, which is where we started about 12 years ago when she was a wee fourth grader. I made an exception to my usual 6th grade minimum age requirement because she was an exceptional child and private lessons meant much more help and attention.

Here’s a drawing she did in about 5th grade.

Here is the drawing she just completed.

She has become an exceptional adult. To quote another one of my drawing students who has known her through the years, “She’s all that AND a bag of chips!”

Protecting identity, because this IS the World Wide Web.

Central Calif. Artist Work

This is a commissioned pencil drawing I finished in July. I haven’t posted it because I didn’t know if the intended recipient reads my blog. (If you recognize yourself, please pretend to be surprised when you receive the drawing!)

Cats in the house

HEY! WHY DO YOU THINK YOU CAN WEASEL YOUR WAY INTO OUR HOUSE??

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Sold in Summer—Pencil Drawings

Five of these pencil drawings sold at my solo show in Tulare, “Around Here (and Sometimes a Little Farther)”. The others were pencil commissions, which I showed you with all the slow developments in painstaking detail.